Helmer Smith was, as a student of Andersen, mainly a Pāli scholar, also familiar with Sinhalese (important article in 1950). He was a skilled linguist who also knew some Hindi, Tamil, Old Norse, Slavic, Fenno-Ugrian and Semitic (and of course Latin and Greek). Known as a specialist of metrics, a sharp critic and meticulous scholar. He never took a Ph.D. and published little of his wide learning. The Saddanīti with its indices, concordances and appendices gave a solid basis for ancient Pāli grammar. Among his students were Aalto and Simonsson.